The Many Shades of Communication Research in South Asia

Abstract

An this paper, I would like to present and discuss communication research and my encounter with it mostly in India for over a quarter of a century. While doing so, I have made a few assumptions and observations about communication research in South Asia and, broadly, Asia. First, it would be important to indicate that in South Asia, communication research cannot be visualised as an integrated whole or it would be difficult to find a body of media and/or communication research that can be referred to as communication research. Communication research, for all theoretical and practical purposes, is divided and continues to be fragmented into conventional, well established, sub-disciplines known for over a century as cinema, radio, television, newspaper and advertising, to mention a few. Now, the Internet and telecommunication have been added to the list. So when one starts looking at communication research in its broad sense, it would be difficult to find any defined body of research methods and techniques at one place.